Yea I'm gonna have to agree here. Yes, Malcolm X was not a very white friendly guy for many many years but he was entirely influenced by the wrong kind of Muslim fairly early in his life during a time when he needed something to keep himself out of jail. While this is unfortunate, X should be praised for being willing to admit he was wrong and change his ways. In the end I think he played an essential role in American politics of the time.

For 30 years he ran a company that did extremely unethical things to dominate the marketplace. After he made his tens of billions, he started to try to try to act a bit better.

Under his leadership, Microsoft did some pretty unethical things:

The were known to tell a company Microsoft wanted to buy them out, when that company hesitated, Microsoft bought their biggest customer and then refused to buy from them, forcing them to either accept Microsoft's buyout offer or go out of business

As shown in their "halloween documents", Microsoft went on a FUD campaign against Linux, lying about the total cost of ownership, hinting at patents being infringed, doing everything they could do to scare people into avoiding Linux and buying Microsoft products

Microsoft was convicted of abusing its monopoly position in the browser wars, pushing competitive browsers out of the market. They did things like modify API calls to slow down competitors, while doing everything they could to force IE on users. In this trial they even falsified evidence they submitted. They were convicted and the judge ordered the company broken up as a result, but they dragged their heels long enough for the George W Bush admin to take power, after which they were let off with a slap on the wrist

There's a lot more too. Basically, anybody who thinks Gates is an ethical person is probably very young, or has had their head in the sand for a long time.

He also donated billion of dollars to charity and is in a campaign to get more super-rich to donate at least half their earnings to charity after their death.

All the other things you mentioned were business stuff. Divorce capitalism from morality, please. The point of capitalism is to be as competitive as possible without breaking the law, and any charge that a big company is being unfair to a smaller business by trying to shut them out...well, it's kinda missing the entire point of our economic system, isn't it? If Microsoft didn't FUD Linux as much as possible, then Linux would gain some of their share.

Yes, Microsoft did some illegal things, but it did it in the context of a corporation. I don't think it's fair to judge Bill Gates individually on that, especially considering that it's a bunch of chairpeople who actually make the decisions, not just Gates.

And somehow I doubt that the starving people of the world being fed by Gates' charity are going to care about his business practices in the US.

I didn't specify large or small companies. I'm saying that it's silly to say "Microsoft is just so mean to Linux!" You can complain all you want about the Halloween documents, but that is capitalism. It's not about being nice, it's about competing so your business doesn't lose customers and you don't have to fire employees, etc. It's the game of capitalism. In much the same as how rude it is to throw your body against someone else's body to get them on the ground in real life, but in the game of football it's not only acceptable, but expected. Spreading FUD is never immoral under the capitalist system. And if Microsoft broke the law, then they should be punished, and laws should be passed to prevent anti-competitive behavior. But assigning morality to any of this just seems naive.

EDIT: please don't downvote Pineapillar for having an opinion, please? We're trying to have a conversation here and it isn't even particularly nasty.

Donating millions for your public image does not mean you are ethical, only that you care about your public image, and that you have the means to do so.

Is it a good thing? Yes, of course, it’s always good that someone gives money to noble causes.

Is that person ethical? He doesn’t have to.

And yeah, judging bill gates out of microsoft actions isn’t fair, but bill gates founded it, and was the CEO until some years ago. An inhuman action isn’t justified by « business stuff ».

Divorce capitalism from morality, please.

No. In no way capitalism should be put apart when judging someone or something, just because it’s business stuff. The board members are humans, the CEO is human, the shareholders are human, and the policy that a company dictates is dictated by humans. And I can judge humans, a group of them, or their actions alltogether.

Donating millions for your public image does not mean you are ethical, only that you care about your public image, and that you have the means to do so.

Billions. Additionally, it would have been easy for him to pull a Zuckerberg and donate a billion dollars to someone. But he went above and beyond. His charity seems to be his main focus in life. He and Warren Buffett are in a drive to pressure other billionaires to donate at least half their savings.

If you honestly think that he's only doing this shallowly, I think that you may be a bit too cynical for your own good.

judging bill gates out of microsoft actions isn’t fair

Yes, so stop doing it.

but bill gates founded it

And the McDonalds brothers founded McDonalds. That has absolutely nothing to do with what Ray Kroc did with the francise, or any CEO since him.

No. In no way capitalism should be put apart when judging someone or something, just because it’s business stuff. The board members are humans, the CEO is human, the shareholders are human, and the policy that a company dictates is dictated by humans. And I can judge humans, a group of them, or their actions alltogether.

Listen, arguing that it's wrong to spread FUD about a rival in the business world is like arguing it's wrong to tackle someone in football. Everyone expects it, everyone prepares for it, they will do it to you if given a chance, and its, in a way, for your own survival. And yet we view football players as humans, and not bad humans either. Such as there's no such thing as morality during football games but instead the concept of rules which dictates it, neither should there be a such thing as morality in the business world, but instead rules which clearly describe what is and isn't allowed, backed up by the justice system. Linux is a competitor to Microsoft. Microsoft wants to eliminate them as a competitor. How can anyone find fault with that? If you find fault with that, then you should find fault with 90% of actions companies do.

And the McDonalds brothers founded McDonalds. That has absolutely nothing to do with what Ray Kroc did with the franchise.

This argument is moot. Bill Gates didn't just found Microsoft, he ran it for four decades. The unethical behavior wasn't done by someone else and blamed on him because he started the business. He was the one calling the shots, and he is accountable.

Yes, he's very charitable, but Bill Gates is really sitting in a morally gray area. He's not a bad guy, but he's not a saint, either. I suggest we stop using him as the example we give as being "Good without God", because if he's really the best we have to offer, then I can understand why Christians don't like us.

No one said solely responsible, but he was co-founder and CEO of a company doing those things. It isn't like his secretaries said, "Bill we need to push Netscape out of the browser market, by any means necessary," and he said, "I absolutely can't condone your behavior, but as CEO and holder of the largest single block of stock I am powerless to stop you."

Here is why so many atheists get stuck up on this. In our society, many religious folk instantly correlate a lack of religion with a lack of ethics. And we are stuck with this stigma. Consequently, we perpetually try to show and bring up the many wrongs religious individuals have committed, in order to show that religion does not imply ethics either.

Furthermore, we try to emphasize the goodness of atheists, in order to show that a lack of religion does not imply a lack of ethics. But people like you generally don't have a problem with that.

So, religion has a net zero affect on human behavior? Why are there so many religious believers who think otherwise?

I think when Atheists point out the evil some religious people cause they do so to point out the hypocrisy of what those religious people believe. Merely believing in god is overwhelmingly equated with goodness when in fact that is not necessarily so -as you have rightly pointed out.

So, can you admit that belief in religion, as concerns goodness, is nonsense?

Worse than that, his examples were christianity and islam. Both idolize Abraham for trying to butcher his son in the name of yahweh. Their moral imperative isn't humanity, it's doing god's will, however fucked up it may be. That's fundamentally evil.

Merely believing in a God does not make someone good, in the same way that not believing in one does not make someone evil. The choices you make about how you affect the people around you are what determines that.

I don't have a problem with people who believe in a higher power, but rather those who follow ancient texts such as the Bible and Koran. If someone were to follow these texts as they were written, they would surely be classified as evil from an outside point of view.

The morally good Christians and Muslims are the ones who loosely interpret their religious texts. In my opinion, these people are incorrectly labeling themselves to begin with.

No, but it justifies it in a way that non-religion, by definition, cannot. If I, as an atheist, do evil, I have to take full responsibility for that evil on myself. If a theist does evil, he can simply claim his God demanded it, and in the eyes of millions of people be completely justified, right, and avoid all responsibility for his actions. In extreme cases, people even praise him for it.

Or one can claim that the good of the nation demanded it, a la Robespierre, Hitler, Mao, Stalin, Pol Pot, or a dozen Latin American petty thug dictators. And those guys were largely praised by their countrymen, and not necessarily under duress.

Or one can claim that the good of your cause demanded it; there are a number of non-religious terrorists. The ETA and Tamil Tigers are/were not religious organizations, and the IRA was only nominally religious.

Religion is a handy justification for evil, but it is by no means the only one. There isn't even much justification for claiming that religion is more effective than nationalism at blinding people to their actions.

(Heck, people don't even need a justification. They just need authority to tell them to, as seen in the Milgram experiment.)

To this I would reply that Evil != Violence. From where I sit, as a middle-class American, homophobia and profound scientific ignorance are motivated pretty much exclusively by the culture of religion, and they lead to some pretty bad things down the road.

Bingo. It's like a guerilla argument. They know their arguments are too weak so they shortly invade and stir things up and they leave to a safe area.

For instance: Some religious person tries to say that science and religion are perfectly compatible. But then suddenly a subject comes up that comes into his religious territory but is explained by science, they will sneak in with a weak argument and attempt an attack on science and atheism.

Just like now, all the time it is argued that religion is needed for moral behaviour. But in this argument they make a weak attack and pretend the last argument never existed.

The argument is opportunistic and hypocritical at nature, and I didn't expect anything else.

This. This is the error with the OP's reasoning. He is equating religiously-motivated evil with ego-motivated evil. You can blame 9/11 on religious extremism, but you can't really blame atheism for Stalin or Mao any more than you could blame wearing green military jackets.

Wasn't Stalin raised religiously and then trained to be monk? Also he adopted this concept from Lenin, the method was to remove a an opiate "Religion" from the Soviet Union. Stalin had a different policy outside of the Soviet Union, he supported the Communist Uyghur Muslim separatists under Ehmetjan Qasim in the Ili Rebellion against the Anti Communist Republic of China regime. He supplied weapons to the Uyghur Ili army and Red Army support against Chinese forces, and helped them established the Second East Turkestan Republic of which Islam was the official state religion.

Joseph Stalin was a former Seminary student who told his daughter, upon being asked why he had a copy of the bible (after years of being dictator) that he believed Jesus was real. (According to her own biography of him.)

I disagree. Good people can still be manipulated to do evil things, even without religion. Immediate examples that pop into mind: The Stanford Prison Experiment and Milgram Experiment. There are many different contributors (environmental, cultural) that can cause people to act in evil ways, to think it is only religion demonstrates a severe lack of knowledge about human psychology.

It's probably more true that we have religion because most people are fallible and deluded thinkers (almost by nature, considering all the cognitive biases individuals face on a daily basis - that includes even atheists), not that religion in-itself makes people fallible and deluded.

But it easier to commit an evil act if society will not think poorly of your behaviour. The two experiments you give as example are situations in which we recognize evil behaviour. In the case of religion the conclusion could be different. I'll take an extreme example for clarity so take it with a grain of salt.

What if the Stanford Prison experiment was done with 10 catholic subjects as guards and 1 pope as warden. The pope is their instructor in this case. Then assume the experiment concludes in the same manner. If the 10 guards are genuinely convinced they did the work of God, will they recognize their evil? Will their fellow catholics recognize the evil. Will it be harder for society not to condemn them?

In other words, even if the acts were just as evil, what stance will society take? Will there be punishments, will there be active prevention? And if so, does the amount of punishment and prevention depend on religion?

Actually I can think of a better example. Let's say a man in Iran is manipulated to beat up another man in clear daylight on the streets. He would be punished for his deed of violence, even though he might have thought that his deed was good. There will be no one to justify his evil deed, not even the manipulator. The manipulator is probably long gone, to protect his own skin.

Now a man beats up a known homosexual in the street. It is, without a doubt, equally evil as the previous deed. Again, he was manipulated to think his deed was good. But this time, society will protect him and will refuse to acknowledge this act of evil. And worst of all, the manipulator in this case is free of any blame. The manipulating religion in this case will not be questioned for the violent deed, and still enjoys protection by the state and its people.

I think the evil in the last case has a much higher risk of escalation, and it already has escalated several times. Crusades are a historic example of that, and violence against homosexuals are a current example.

That is a good statement of the problem with dogmatic beliefs like religion.

The premise for a dogmatic belief can be good but the outcome can be bad. The premise for Nazism, for example, was to improve the German economy. Taken to the extreme, however, Nazism became a monster to those who didn't share the dogma.

All dogmas should be questioned all of the time. Likewise with religion.

I would say that it even being true isn't so important if they would just keep it to themselves. Who are we to say others cannot believe in Unicorns and resurrection? It's when they begin to insist that I too must believe in magic or I will be cast to hell for eternity, or when they tell me my friends cannot marry since they are both women and they point to the bible as evidence that I say it matters. That surpasses simple moral boundaries like good and evil, but it does present a situation where a specific group of people has formulated a strange system of ethical practices and then insists with great fervor that the rest of the world subscribe to them, against their will if necessary, to the extent that it is next to impossible to become a political leader in our society unless you at least outwardly assume the role of Christian, and whenever someone so much as suggests a secular viewpoint might be better, they are criticized by an overwhelming majority who at the same time, often in the same breath, then portray themselves as an embattled and oppressed minority whose freedoms are slowly being eroded away by some supposed morally ambiguous super-majority of citizens that doesn't actually exist.

If you think MLK was the definition of a good Christian, you should probably do some research on the stuff he pulled behind closed doors, and behind the back of his wife.

I agree with a number of other comments here that the question isn't about individuals who are good or evil. The real question is whether or not religion overall is good for society or not, and so far I have to disagree with the "live and let live" way of thinking on this.

Hold it there hold it, I know Bill Gates did donate a lot of his wealth, but I don't think he is the best example.

Blackmailed other businesses, hammered free software, kicked his childhood friend out of his company who he had co-founded with, generally only seemed to care about his own wealth(except for charity, I know).

And now his company is constantly ratted out on wikileaks for some horrid things.

I don't believe I've seen even the hint of a consensus on /r/atheism on a stance that good is the exclusive domain of secularism or that evil is the exclusive domain of religion.

We simply point out that there are some religious folk who have a stance that their chosen religion can do no harm and all atrocities committed in the name of it were done by false members or the acts are taken 'out of context'.

These same people will often also take a critical view of secularism, taking the opinion that evil will be the inevitable result without taking into consideration all the facts.

The issue is that the religious generally claim the moral high ground. In doing so, they implicitly invite criticism when members of their religion do immoral things. Atheists don't claim that atheism automatically bestows morality upon people - usually we claim that morality is intrinsic and some people are immoral.

Sure, there are good and bad people in any camp. But the question that should be discussed here is, does religion make people behave better? I think the overwhelming evidence is that it does not. There is nothing a religious person does that can't be done by an atheist. But there are plenty of things a religious person does (because of religion and demands from god) that atheist does not do, like genital mutilation, stoning of adulterers, cutting off of arms and genocide of infidels, to name a few.

Learning about that back in high school was one of the most odd twists that I'd ever heard. It seemed like such a standard revolution until that point when everything just became a bit insane. Dechristianisation was one of the more evil acts of anti-theism

Yeah, the actual construction of altars was pretty bizarre. I haven't read that much about it, but it seems the leaders realized they needed to capitalize on the iconoclasm of the populace by replacing religion with a religious anti-religion.

IIRC, there were a large number of parades held by the Cult. Strange times, to say the least.

I'm sorry, but what the hell are you talking about? "Stretch the meaning of religion to include political ideals"?

Religion is a collection of cultural systems, belief systems, and worldviews that establishes symbols that relate humanity to spirituality and moral values. Wikipedia

I think you are the one who tries to skew the meaning of religion to fit your personal bias.

and anti-theism is a religion

Anti-theism isn't a religion as anti-theism is simply an opinion without any establishment of symbols nor any moral implications nor does it have anything to do with spirituality (quite the opposite, actually).

Also: Just because you don't believe in any God (=atheist) doesn't mean you aren't religious. It simply means you don't believe in any gods.

A Confucianist doesn't believe in any god, either. Confucianism is an inherently atheistic religion. Most Buddhists are atheists, too. These religions usually don't even believe in anything supernatural. They are philosophies that worship the universe and the personal self.

I'm sorry but you seem not to understand the concepts of religion, atheism and anti-theism. Your statements are simply false. I don't understand why you feel the need to reply to these threads if you don't even grasp the concepts you try to base your arguments upon.

It goes beyond just a serious personality cult, North Korean textbooks claim he was born on a mountain (the origin of the Korean kingdoms, by myth), that a new star appeared in the sky, and that a swallow descended from heaven, and a double rainbow appeared.

And anti-theism, unlike the Stalin and Kim Jong Ill cults, does not pretend there is something supernatural going on. There is no worship involved. Stalin and Kim Jong Ill were treated as Gods, or something very close.

The comment is not disputing Stalin's atheism -- it is accusing his regime of religiosity. After all, most interpretations of Buddhism are atheistic and it is a religion. Intentionally or not, the original graphic explicitly mentions religion, rather than belief in God, so there's room to criticize the choice of Stalin -- not for his lack of belief, but for the cult of personality he set up to emulation theistic religion.

In Stanley Milgram's Study of Obedience, 65% of participants continued to administer electric shocks of increasing voltage until the end of the experiment, the administration of the maximum 450-volt shock three times in succession. To get that far, they had to continue after the victim began screaming, pounding on the wall, complaining about their heart condition, and finally ceased responding completely.

To stop the experiment, all they had to do was say they wanted to stop five times (the experimenter would prod them to continue the first four).

No, it isn't only religion that can make a good person do evil things.

I think it's funny that the experiment that you use to show that not only religion leads to evil shows exactly why religion leads to evil. People accept any (even made up) authority and tend to do what they are told. Now what do you think will happen when someone thinks they get direct instructions from the highest authority possible, while it's really just their subconscious blabbering.

Just to clarify, I agree that it's not only religion that makes good people do evil. It's any ideology that promotes a higher/holier than though authority. The thing is, organized religion is a legalized and massively popular ideology that does exactly that. The other ideologies that promote this behavior (North Korea f.ex.) are tiny in comparison.

Authority does play a part, but the problem of evil is more complicated than that.

For instance, another major problem is the way religions foster socialization. Social groups of likeminded people tend to back up eachothers' ideas, gradually losing perspective on opinions outside the group, and leaning the whole towards extremism. Since a church congregation is virtually by definition a group of likeminded people, it's easy to see why so much extremism and hatred can arise from religious groups.

I believe that people in general have an innate sense of what is right and wrong based on what we know we would and would not want to happen to ourselves. It is by pure reason that we have determined not to lie, cheat, steal, and murder. Furthermore, we have no means of attonement for our transgressions, besides true and permanent repentance.

I argue that a strict adherent to moral reason has a more rigid moral code than a religious zealot that believes you can ask for forgiveness and everything will be okay.

I grew up in a Baptist home and lost Jesus all on my own in adulthood. Rampant hypocrisy and false remorse goes a long way in driving people off.

/edit: Repentance in the sense of a change of thought and action with a true sense of remorse, and to help set right past wrongs. Never thought I'd be using this word outside of religious context, but it still applies.

Owned 650 slaves, was an abolitionist who only freed 11 of them. He also came up with the first Indian Removal Plans, including assimilation and extermination. He was very racist, and a sexist. Try again, but I get your point.

I dunno, seems pretty ethical to me. Obama can't run the country exactly like he wants it just because he's president, and Bill Gates doesn't have sole control over Microsoft. But the stuff Bill Gates does seems pretty cool to me.

Not really sure what you are apologizing for. Between the Gates foundation and the fact that he has promised to give away a huge portion of his wealth when he dies, I think he fits the bill of an ethical person without religion.

Martin Luther King Jr. was a good Christian? I wasn't aware that forcing lots of young activists to have sex with you was being a "good Christian". Apparently continually cheating on your wife while convincing vulnerable young girls that fucking you was "empowering the movement" is seen as good Christian behavior. Interesting.

Cute. However, there is no "atheist Bible" or holy text that would tell us it's okay to kill someone for not sharing the same beliefs. This is where the difference lies; we have no way of justifying our actions other than by the consequences or by emotional means.

I fail to see how atheists or r/atheism are known at large for claiming that religion always negatively correlates to ethics. It's a bold claim; would require there never be counter-examples. That's a bit silly, don't you think? To claim there are no good religious people anywhere at any time. Seems a strawman, without reference. Easy to get over something one doesn't claim.

There are perhaps arguments to be made for loose correlations, such as the high standard of living, low crime rates, and high happiness indexes of largely nontheist Scandinavian countries. Or the various make-ups of prison populations. But they are loose correlations, not very solid, and not to even approach causation.

But despite that this graphic already fails by forwarding a strawman to criticize, let's push on to the core of this issue. People can obviously be good and bad with, or isolated from religion. Disregarding people, religion itself is a neutral tool like anything else. But the discussion is how people may mix with the characteristics of that neutral tool. A product, most often accompanied by faith and divine authority.

And in any situation where there is an unchallenged authority who is believed to always be right, mortal or divine, the moral and ethical standards forwarded better happen to be good ones. Yet even if they are, the process that churned them out is still a negative one. Because they are untouchable in several ways. Extra, insidious layers against criticism and refinement.

Atheism holds little in this way. There may be common moral paths atheists take, but it does not forward commandments and the like itself. So the common and uncommon moral paths atheists take, are more open to refinement and criticism, being absent an authority and faith.

And that makes for an important difference when we label people religious or not in this morality context. The nontheists in the graphic, are not responsible as nontheists, but as themselves. Atheism the tool holds no moral standards to blame. However, religious people are a package; the self and the tool mixed to forward a specific morality. Even if one may think they got their specific religious morality wrong... well that's the problem isn't it; good luck convincing them that.

The tool of religion presents an inherent problem that atheism does not. This is the more important discussion than the silliness and cloudiness of the graphic.

Sure being religious doesn't mean you're evil, but c'mon its pretty obvious that these people are believing a hoax. It's better to know the truth even if it bites than live a lie that makes you feel better, because you only grow up with doubt or become delusional. That's just my response to the "deal with it" at the end.

Mystics sometimes argue that religion makes people moral. I disagree: morality is a practical science which can only be understood by rational consideration, not emotionalism (the epistemological method of faith).

To the extent that religious dogmas and religious people preach and act morally, they derive their principles using the same rational methods and the same evidence that is available to everyone. Since rational moral claims need no mystical basis, it is only the irrational and immoral actions which require religious justification. To the extent that religious beliefs as such influence people’s actions, they can only influence them to do wrong – sometimes unspeakable and sometimes trivial, but still evil.

I think atheist who think all the major evil in the world comes from religion are just a naive as they think the religious are. People have been doing bad for a long time study and psychology or history and you will realize bad is part of us. That special kind of blood lust which we call war is in our bones.